The Cowboy and the Lady. Diana Palmer

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СКАЧАТЬ on some urgent business. But Jace is home.”

      Amanda felt something give way inside her, and she fought back the urge to leap back aboard the plane and go home. Instead, she followed the two of them to the car and allowed herself to be placed in the front seat with Marguerite while Terry loaded their bags and got in the back seat.

      “The weather’s nice,” Terry commented as Marguerite headed the sleek little car toward the city.

      “But dry this year.” Marguerite sighed. She didn’t go into the various ways droughts played havoc with a ranch. Amanda already knew, and it would have taken the better part of an hour to explain it to someone who wasn’t familiar with cattle.

      “I’m looking forward to seeing the ranch,” Terry volunteered.

      Marguerite smiled over her shoulder at him. “We’re rather proud of it. I’m sorry you had to take a commercial flight. Jace could have come after you, but Tess was with him, and I didn’t think you’d care for her company,” she added with a wry glance at Amanda.

      “Tess?” Terry probed.

      “Tess Anderson,” Marguerite replied. “Her father and Jace are partners, with Duncan of course, in that real estate venture in Florida.”

      “Will we have to consult him about the account as well?” Terry asked.

      “I shouldn’t think so,” the older woman replied conversationally. “He always goes along with whatever Jace says.”

      “How is Tess?” Amanda asked quietly.

      “Just the same as always, Amanda,” came the haunted reply. “With one hand reaching out toward Jace eternally.”

      Amanda remembered that. Tess had always been a step away from him, since they were in their teens. Jace had offered to take Amanda to a dance once—a mysterious offer that Amanda had refused in silent terror. Tess had got wind of it, and given Amanda the very devil, as if it had been her fault that Jace asked her.

      “Tess and Amanda were at school together,” Marguerite told Terry. “In Switzerland, you know.”

      It seemed like a hundred years ago. Amanda’s family had lost everything when Bob Carson was caught with his financial fingers in a crooked land deal. The shock of discovery had caused a fatal heart attack, and he’d died leaving his stunned wife and daughter to deal with the monumental disgrace and debt. By the time the creditors were satisfied there was nothing left, Jace had offered to help. Amanda still blushed when she remembered exactly how he’d presented the cold-blooded proposition to her. She’d never told anyone about it. But the memory was still with her, and she’d always believed her refusal had fanned Jace’s contempt.

      After the ranch went on the auction block, Amanda had carried her journalism degree to Terry Black’s office, and the association rapidly became a partnership. The job kept the wolf from the door, when Bea wasn’t on a marathon spending spree and so long as she imposed on her wealthy friends with long visits. The sacrificing was all on Amanda’s part, not on her mother’s. Bea liked pretty clothes and shoes, and she bought them impulsively, always apologizing for her lapses and bursting into tears if Amanda was stern with her. Every day of her life Amanda thanked God for time payments. And every other day, she wondered if Bea was ever going to grow up.

      “I said, how’s Bea?” Marguerite prompted gently, breaking into her weary musings.

      “Oh, she’s fine,” Amanda said quickly. “With the Bannons this season.”

      “The Bahamas.” Marguerite sighed. “Those lovely straw hats and musical accents and blistering white beaches. I wish I were there now.”

      “Why not go?” Terry asked.

      “Because the first time Mrs. Brown was fussy about Jason missing breakfast, he’d fire her,” came the tight reply, “and this is the only time I’ve ever been able to keep a cook longer than three months. I’m standing guard over this one.”

      Terry looked out the back window uncomfortably. “He sounds a little hard to please.” He laughed nervously.

      “It depends on the mood he’s in,” Marguerite said. “Jason can be very kind. He’s always easy to get along with when he’s asleep. The only time we have problems is when he’s awake.”

      Amanda laughed. “You’ll scare Terry to death.”

      “Don’t worry, now,” Marguerite promised. “Just make sure he hasn’t been near the cattle when you approach him, Terry.” She frowned slightly. “Let’s see, Sunday evenings are fairly safe, if nothing’s broken down or if…”

      “We’ll talk to Duncan first,” Amanda promised her colleague. “He doesn’t bite.”

      “He doesn’t always have Tess underfoot, either,” Marguerite said in a faintly goaded tone.

      “Maybe Jace will relent and marry her someday,” Amanda suggested.

      The older woman sighed. “I had hoped that you might be my daughter-in-law one day, Amanda.”

      “Be grateful for small blessings,” came the smiling reply. “Duncan and I together would have driven you crazy.”

      “I wasn’t thinking about my youngest,” Marguerite said with frightening candor, and the look she gave Amanda made her pulse race.

      She looked away. “Jace won’t ever forgive me for that bull.”

      “It was unavoidable. You didn’t ask the silly bull to crash through the fence.”

      “Jace was so angry,” she recalled, shuddering. “I thought he was going to hit me.”

      “I always thought he was angry for a quite different reason. Oh, damn,” Marguerite added with perfect enunciation when they turned into the long paved driveway that led to Casa Verde. “That’s Tess’s car,” she grumbled.

      Amanda saw it, a little Ferrari parked in the circular space that curved around the fishpond and fountain in front of the two-storey mansion.

      “At least you know where Jace is,” Amanda said lightly, although her pulse was doing double time.

      “Yes, but I knew where he was when Gypsy was alive, and I liked Gypsy,” Marguerite said stubbornly.

      “Who was Gypsy?” Terry asked the two women, who both had burst into laughter.

      “Jace’s dog,” Amanda volunteered through her giggles.

      Marguerite pulled up behind the small black car and cut the engine. The house was over a century old, but still solid and welcoming, retaining its homey atmosphere. To Amanda, who loved it and remembered it from childhood, it wasn’t a mansion or even a landmark. It was simply Duncan’s house.

      “Duncan and I used to hang by our heels from those low limbs on the oak tree at the corner of the house,” Amanda told Terry as they walked up the azalea-lined path that led to the porch steps. “Duncan slipped and fell one day, and if Jace hadn’t caught him, his head would have been half its present size.”

      “I shudder to think what might СКАЧАТЬ